Sales can be a tough job, especially if, as George Carlin would have said, “you’re not doing it right, man!” Here’s something you can do that works that very few sales reps actually practice anymore: write notecards. A simple, handwritten, notecard can work magic like almost no other tool available and here’s why:

No one else is doing it!It’s just not “cool” anymore to handwrite a note. It’s old-fashioned, and it’s not “techy”. Then you have …

C-Level conversations got you baffled? They don’t respond in the same way as the “order-takers” downstairs, do they? So how do you talk to these people? They think about different things than the rank-and-file and they think about them from a markedly different point-of-view. Here’s 9 things to consider when talking to someone in the C-Suite.

Do your homework.
Don’t ask stupid questions, the answers to which you could have known had you done #1.
NO conversational chit-chat …

One of the oldest arguments in the book! Do I sell based on my price or try and convince my prospect there’s enough value to pay more for it than my competition is charging?
Selling based on price is for cowards. Reps that are absolutely convinced of the merits of their product/service, delivery, and support package don’t feel the need to give anything away. Why should they? The goose lays golden eggs, for cryin’-out-loud. I’ve seen …

What you think about determines everything else. Your attitude, and your outcome.
If that’s true, then all you have to do is determine what you want the outcome to be. Determine what it would take to acquire your goal then start thinking about that and don’t stop until you get it.
Odd that some people are not at all sure there’s a God but the same folks are quite positive there’s a devil. Or that the …

Are we in a recession? I don’t think so. A down economy, yes, but not a recession. The generally accepted definition of a recession states that a recession exists when we have two consecutive calendar quarters of negative economic growth. And even then the “recession” has already been in play for 6 months! There are three qualifiers in the defining statement above: two, consecutive, and negative.
TWO, CONSECUTIVE, NEGATIVE
Nope, don’t qualify here. We’ve had one negative …

A recent question on the LinkedIn site asked, and I’m paraphrasing, should a sales rep know his competition and how important is that? Also, should he know anything about his customers?
Yes, Virginia, people still ask that sort of stuff. I couldn’t resist so I penned the answer below, and we’ll leave it to speak for itself. See if you agree.
Wow! What a range of conflicting answers. I used to be all over the map as …